Jarrod's page

Has anyone written up a guide to Alhaster? If so, could you post a link here? The one in the magazine is a good start, but I'd prefer something a little lighter on the spoilers :)

We're about to start Prince of Redhand, and one of the characters will be quite familiar with the city. I would like to give him notes to play off of (rather than constant Knowledge (local) checks), and if I could avoid retyping the entire section on Alhaster that would be great.

One of the things the PCs can do before attacking Kyuss is to detour past the Tomb of Horrors and pick up a Sphere of Annihilation - the "green demon face". Problem is, my players never did run through ToH, and as a result I think that snagging the ToH SoA would lose a lot of its impact. I've been trying to figure out a way to make this more important without losing the main point: that Kyuss needs to be taken down.

And I think I have it. While my players never did ToH, they _did_ play through Monte Cook's Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. And one of the artifacts in the Outer Fane of the Temple is a Sphere of Annihilation. More to the point, the players will actually recognize it.

Which brings up my challenge: to design the inhabitants of the (recently cleared) Outer Fane of the Temple. I figure the original party cleared things out about three years ago (keeping real time), and since then new cultists would have moved in.

Given the Sphere, the cult leader should be an entropomancer from Complete Divine. So that the campaign doesn't get derailed I'm thinking the challenges should be in the 10 (mooks) to 18 range - nothing the PCs can't handle, but fun.

Any ideas for strange creatures that would be attracted to a cult of entropy and destruction?

The real undead-heavy parts start coming later in the path, starting with the Spire. I'm going to have Manzorian's reward for the party rogue (from the Rod of 7 parts) be a sword capable of sneak attacking undead.

I clue-batted them into buying scrolls of Spell Immunity for the party.

One of the characters is aiming towards being a prophet. He got a message that said "You are all going to die if you keep going". That led them to the scrolls.

They hadn't met Zyrxog in the sodden hold, so they hadn't yet seen a mind flayer. And with a DC 23 Will (+ levitation), plus being a level down due to more players, plus the cleric taking a 9/10 progression prestige class... yeah, they were all going to die. And not even in a "fair but tough" way.

More emails are always good :)

abernat at zathras dot net

I also replaced the drow thralls with generic folks (bugbear stats on average) with the Voidmind template from MM3. It worked very well; gives Zyrxog a bit of warning as well.

Or keep Axiomatic, but remove the negative energy levels. It's an artifact after all.

Then have it keep nudging the bard to become lawful. Not intelligent per se, but suggestions.

I ran a Murder in Oakbridge (I think... Eberron murder mystery) for the party on their way through Sharn to Blackwall Keep. It gave them some hooks back to Sharn. Also, some amusement... the cleric is a warforged (looking for the God of Warforged) and the Silver Flame cleric now thinks that he is the next Prophet to the Created Ones.

Fun times.

As for the doppleganger plot... I decided to have some fun with it. The 'gangers are going to accidentally grab the party sorceress... who is a changeling with Still, Silent, and a short range teleport. Instead of the annoying "backstabbing party member" plot, it'll give them some more information when she gets out of jail and decides to go investigating. It'll also let the character flex her Changeling muscles, which hasn't really been happening on camera.

I'd actually like to see an AP where some (30%ish?) of the adventures had nothing directly to do with the main plot.

I've been loving AoW, but it gets the feeling (Blackwall Keep currently) that wherever the PCs go, they trip over green worms. Running down to the corner store? Bum on the corner is a Kyuss Zombie. Hitting a college reunion? Green worms. I know that it's part of the epic prophecy feel, but my players are going "uhh... this is feeling clunky" rather than "uhh... guys? I'm getting a little weirded out...".

I'm all for a slowly developing plot, but this is feeling a little over the top.

Go with it. Mostly because the PCs enjoy being high level.

Eberron's weird, though. I get the distinct feeling there are Epic Level People (tm) around, just that you never hear about them. Heck, the kings never hear about them. Advisors... well, they probably do.

There are some seriously nasty bad guys (Rajahs, Daelkyr, Quori), and I would expect some big guns to keep them sealed away should anyone get the idea of letting them out. Heck, the entire Age of Worms is really just someone trying to let Kyuss out. So either a lucky group of PCs goes 20 each time this happens, or there are high-level PCs out there that stop them.

... you just never hear about 'em.

I've got a campaign with two Warforged in it. Little do they know, the original Warforged (not these modern knock-offs) were designed as a major effort against Kyuss/the original Rajah. The originals had natural armor sufficient to stop the worms and couldn't rise again if the worms did kill them.

Unfortunately, the modern ones aren't really designed the same way. I think it'll take the worms twice as long to munch them (half effect from healing spells, so it kinda balances).

On the other hand, _anyone_ who was around early on (AKA thousand years ago) will recognize a Warforged and put them first on the list of things to be hurt. "I see, the Constructs return. You think you can stop me? Your puny masters may have made you immune to my gifts, but I have less... pleasant... methods."

Ummm... hi :)

Different Drew, I'm guessing.

HI DREW!

Hrm... what to do, what to do. I like the sorcerer feel. Not for combat effectiveness, but in a similar way to a beholder: a creature that cannot interact with the world through four fingers and a thumb learns magical tricks around it. Keep the V,S components, but specialize them for a spider. Mage hand to move things around. It's good for freaking out the PCs. Well, and True Strike before attacking one of the PCs. If you have non-Core, Complete Adventurer has a number of Swift activation spells that make sense.

And I checked Daggerspell again... eh. Good if you want to up the sneak attack, but probably not worth it... the rest of the abilities really don't synergize at all.

As for freaky monsters... it's mini HB, but I just noticed a CR 3 monster with a ranged touch attack: +5, 3d10+8+1d6 fire. CR 3. Now that's whacky.

There's always Lesser Telepathic Bond from the Complete books.

"The spider makes hissing and clicking noises... and a voice speaks in your head"

As for spell casting, I'd go again with the hissing and clicking and hand-wave the rest. He still can't cast in a Silence, after all.

Mmmm phase spider rogue/sorcerer. Rogue is associated, sorcerer sure isn't. Maybe into Daggerspell from CompAdv? I like the idea of magical claws.

I'm having so much fun with this one....

So one PC shows up that wants to have a link to the dwarven mine manager. Nephew who hasn't seen him in years... see, he disappeared during a mine collapse, and hasn't been heard of since. Everyone thought he was dead, and so on. So he's looking for his uncle, who (until very recently) was hiding in his house - the cultists blackmailing him. Pretty close to as written, except a little more sympathetic.

Smenk, on the other hand... wow. He hired the PCs to "go figure out what was going on", "because he had the best interests of the town at heart". I'm playing him as the kind of guy that puts everything in terms of "favors for my friends". PCs hate it, by the way... anyway. PCs go deal with Theldrick, and discover a map to the Grimlocks on the outskirts of town (standard modification 1: split up the three areas). Smenk notices they're healing up and asks what's going on...

"We still don't know where Dourstone is, he's disappeared. There were 'undesireables' in the mine, but they're gone now."

So, I ask everyone: is there _any_ reason that Smenk won't move in on the mine? The owner is gone, and he can basically assume control under the guise of a regency.

I need to stat up a weapon of legacy...

One of my players is playing a character who grew up in Diamond Lake. In fact, his family has always lived in Diamond Lake. He's playing a Hexblade, which gives me plenty to play around with -- "he has the Touch" and all that.

So his story is that he's actually a descendant of the Wind Dukes. Not enough to make a big difference, but enough to make him strange. He's been hearing voices whenever he's in the Whispering Cairn, and the air elemental creatures from the end tried talking to him. The player is convinced the character is going nuts...

Anyway. They found a sword (great scimitar) that is too big for anyone else to use, but works for him just fine. It's one of the original Wind Duke weapons, and since he's got a touch of the "old blood" it works for him. I'm looking to build it as a chaos/law blade. The character is chaotic, which just makes things that much more fun.

Note to self: he needs to meet a hag that starts babbling about the "old blood". Gold.

You could also look at it this way. Smenk is currently the big man in town, and a lot of people owe him. They also probably don't _like_ owing him. So, if something comes up that could take Smenk down, the law won't really trouble themselves with "the truth"... it's all an excuse to become the new top dog.

"But, but, they were blackmailing m.." "Shut up!" <smack>

Also, linky: www.worldworksgames.com/arenaworks.html

Is there any chance we could get a rough sketch of the arena (5' scale sort of thing) before the actual module comes out? I'd _love_ to do a paper replica, and matching it with the actual map would make my life much easier. It looks like the module really focuses on arena combat, and many of my PCs would be happy with the same.

Would you people get off my download! Sheesh, it seems like they're going with PigeonNet (tm). All this waiting and people can't be patient...

... except me. Yeah. That's the ticket.

Good point. Hrm... I think I might go with the (possibly unsatisfying) "this was all foretold" approach. After all, the third one is enemy action, right?

Not so much pervasive, as the PCs were destined to run into this.

Actually, I think I may make him a Diviner specialist. Necromancer, sure, but a guy that knows _everything_ is much creepier. And if he's digging into forgotten lore, then a Diviner would fit.

Give him some off-the-cuff capabilities that explain why he's prepared. Sure, he heard the alarm, but how boring is that? "I foresaw your attack. You were late. And you shall fail, as the sky has already been written." Think Emperor from Star Wars.

Was it just me or did the PDF end at Chapter 5? I didn't see anything past there.

It's an oddity of the D&D system - size and stat mods to damage are set, not made up. The 1d3 is size, -3 from strength. Now, if some nasty cast a Bull's Strength on the worm, it would go up to 1d3-1.

Also, remember that there is always a minimum of 1 point of damage. So 1d3-3 will deal 1 point of damage. Which reminds me of a rogue I had... 1d3-2 damage. +8d6 sneak attack, but hey....

Why am I suddenly not wanting to drink taequila now that I have read about the Kyuss worms in potions?

Me: ROFLMAO

The real question is, will you discover a worm if you use Craft (Alchemy) to identify a potion? I would have to say yes, either that or PCs are _incredibly_ gullible about the treasure they pick up. "Sure, there's no seal on this vial and I only tested a small amount, but hey! Chug!"

And instead of a "vial filled with potion", would it make it a "vile filled potion"? :)

Yeah, it's time to go back home for him. That will actually be _very_ cool.

So the two big powers in the lizzie tribe are the king (dragon-puppet nasty fighter-type) and the shaman. The shaman doesn't particularly like the dragon and the interference it has created, but knows better than to rock the boat. If the PCs can talk with the shaman they can get a _lot_ of assistance, turning the hack-and-slash into a "well, if you can get rid of the king <wink> I can keep the rest of the tribe peaceful".

There's even a lizardman infected with a worm that the PCs can rescue. I'm entirely unsure how they're supposed to figure this out (other than, say, killing the lizard), but a lizardman would probably recognize a sick member of his species.

And I'm sorry, but a dragon egg filled with worms that spill out and try to make spawn is _freaking cool_. If the lizardmen are friendly there will probably be a great scene with lizards running in, grabbing their eggs, and trying to save as many as possible while a flood of green worms makes lizard-hatchling-zombettes. Yummy.

One new idea brought up in the module is "worm-tainted potions". Basically, there's a Kyuss worm in a bunch of the potions you find. There are rules for realizing you just swallowed something whole (ick...), but I'm unsure if the PCs would discover the worm while analyzing the potion. I'm a nice GM so the answer is probably yes, but.... mwahahahahaha and all that.

Our group normally calculates XP at the end of each session, often with a player doing the math while the GM reads CRs. For the AoW I've explicitly stopped that behavior, emailing XP out after the session. This is primarily to control the XP.

As you said, the XP can be a bit high or low. So I've been calculating XP, then fudging it to where I'm happy. For example, the PCs levelled after fighting the first beetle swarm, as they were heading back into down for a few days anyway and it seemed like a good time to have them level (they were 150XP short). I'm also planning to have them "level" after they deal with Filge, leaving them at 3rd for the final assault on the Cairn. It's a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants method, but seems to be working well.

Just got it today. In fact, about half an hour ago.

Lessee... the Age of Worm's first dragon is mentioned, but does not show up. Overview is pretty cool, and I'm thinking there are possibilities here...

The 2nd-to-last generation of lizardfolk eggs (in the Mistmarsh) were eaten by masses of green worms. Oops. This is actually what is responsible for the lack of lizardmen attacks recently. The lizardmen were visited by a black dragon who said she wanted to help the lizards and blamed the Free City for the worms; in fact, she's to blame and the Free City just happened to be there. The dragon is now incubating (right... suuuuure) the latest batch of lizardmen eggs.

Adventure overview: PCs are hired by Allustan to check out (with him) Blackwall Keep. They arrive to find it assaulted by lizardfolk. After beating back ze lizards, they discover that soldiers have been taken. Allustan poofs (via scroll of teleport) to go get help, and PCs go rescue soldiers. This runs them into the lizardfolk, some of whom are unhappy about the dragon; diplomacy can actually get them allies against the current regime. Finally, the PCs return to the keep only to find a thing (Spawn, looks like) in the basement they have to fight.

Three parts: keep, lizards, back to the keep, though the third part is very brief. Stats are given for Allustan.

Encounter levels vary between 3 and 8. Most are 5s, with the 8 either being the lizard king or the big encounter in Parts 2 and 3. There's all sorts of ick with the green worms.

I think my favorite encounter is the egg room, actually. There's a single big egg that looks like a dragon egg. It's actually filled with worms, and if the PCs crack it open the worms escape and start infecting the lizardmen eggs that surround it. Oopsie :) Treasure for that encounter is a bunch of potions tainted with "slow spawn"... can be very nasty.

My group was talking about making the trap an amusement park ride... they found (and IDed) the ring of feather falling before sending the thief up to check out the trap. He spotted the plate and put on the ring before triggering it... sigh.

Silly take 20s.

On the other hand, he didn't spot the plate in the middle of the next room. Did that remind anyone else of a scene in the Incredibles?

I had Mr. Albino Half-Orc kick the crud out of one PC :)

The usual suspects:

Reason, warforged fighter, drifts into town and runs into the Gang of Five. They ambush him (ooh ray of enfeeblement in the back) and beat on him for a while, dealing a reasonable amount of non-lethal damage. I figured that Kellum (sp?) does this every so often on a lark.

Fortunato, human hexblade (ex-miner named Fred Bloggs), was sitting in the Feral Dog when this happened. He didn't get involved as he had had his runs with Kellum, but when prompted by a friendly NPC helped carry Reason to the healers.

Seeker, warforged cleric, had heard the noise and was heading that way. They met up and Reason took some of the weight of the 400-some-odd-pound warforged. Oof.

Melina, human sorcerer, is apprenticed to the healer, and arrives when they get there. Healer and her try to get rid of the strength drain until it goes away a few minutes later (I figured nobody knew about RoE and ability penalties).

The next day Fortunato, possessor of a map he stole from good 'ol Balabar, makes a "proposition" that they explore these areas. He asks the warforged for their armor and Melina as the healer's apprentice. The healer, an old adventurer, tells her to go "but keep up on her studies".

And in the most amusing bit, the rogue, Jack, knocks on the door of the abandoned mine office after they were done looting it (he was absent for the first session). He'd been watching and trailing 'em. Intro was a bit forced, but it's all good.

The key parts for me were 1) get antagonism against Mr. Half-Orc and 2) get people to hate Balabar. The final piece of the puzzle was the rival adventurers... the local-town people (Fortunato and Melina) wanted to show them up, and the out-of-towners (Jack and Reason, with Seeker a bit on this side) were just bored and easily led.

WC does say "If Auric survives, the PCs will encounter him in the Free City Arena."

I haven't done much with the rivals yet. The PCs pretty much ignored them as stupid city folk off to loot an empty cairn. Time marches on, and rumors do fly... and when the PCs sell off loot for a second time the rivals will definitely take notice. Khellek isn't above a little Detect Thoughts to figure out what's going on, and that rogue might put the moves on someone.

We just hit the bug fight. Mmmm tasty.

I have five people in my group: an adamantine warforged fighter, an adamantine warforged cleric, a hexblade, a rogue, and a sorc. The warforged had been going along nearly invulnerable to everything, so when they heard the beetles, they figured "why not". The sorc booked, as she didn't like bugs... and enchantment spells kinda bounce on beetles.

A minute later, "What do you mean I take 6 points of damage??? Acid? ARGH!".

Put the fear of GM in them for sure. Wonderful. They ended up running :)

Best moment: beetles swarm the rogue, he goes down at -2. Cleric comes up and drops a Cure Minor in him, figuring that "the beetles won't hurt someone unconscious". Riiiight... so next turn the beetles munch both the rogue and the cleric. Oopsie.

Next person up dragged the body away....

I really played up the hometown/High 'n Mighty Adventurers angle to get the PCs into Whispering. "Yeah, those tough guys from the big city think they'll find loot in Stirgenest. Heh. Only thing they'll find is a bunch of initials carved in the wall". One of the PCs stole a map from Smenk in backstory, and once be brought it out it wasn't hard to manipulate them into "And what'll everyone think when we find _actual loot_!"

That, and hinting that Smenk thought the map was important -- note in the margin of "send a team".

Very cool. 'course, I'm not sure what everything stands for, but hey, that's the spice of life.

Now I just need to print 'em, and hope my players set off the "Trap of DOOM! (tm)"

Interesting... how did he get ahold of the Mace of Commune to use it?

As for Zenith hanging out in the Temple that is no problem... there are plenty of times that the PCs can't be gaurding it and there is enough chances with chaotic stuff going on that you can get Zenith out of the temple and into a cage... if not sooner you can do it during the eruption.

Sean Mahoney

Asked the priestess to ask about it, actually. Exalted wizard, and he's very worried about the consequences of actions.

And yeah, the Cagewrights'll get him. It does serve as a good example of how there are gaps in some of the motivation for several modules that a GM needs to work around. In this case, the PCs went and fetched, they just didn't deliver. And, no, the Cagewrights didn't buy their story :)

No attachment :/

Go ahead and email 'em to abernat (at) gmail.com. Probably easier that way.

Or am I just missing something obvious? BTW, I have 125 and can make a monster list for you if you'd like.

Sigh... poor Zenith.

Our group had two "interesting" events happen. First, a fighter with reach. Zenith either had to break defensive stance or get pounded on. Oy.

And then the mage, being a suspicious bastard, uses the Temple Mace Commune to ask "Is returning Zenith to the people who hired us beneficial for him?". Uhh.... noo....

So Zenith's hanging out in the Temple of St. Cuthbert now...

And I don't see CdGing Zenith, given that he's malevolent and surrounded by corpses, as an evil act. But yeah, definitely make that come back to haunt them :)

One reason for tougher encounters -- they use less space in the magazine. Ah, well.

We have:

Reason, warforged fighter. Came into town looking for a forge to hammer out some dents, met Seeker (below), and has decided to hang around and see what happens.
Seeker, warforged cleric. Working as a mine guard, recently had an ephiphany and is now seeking (heh) for the God of Warforged.
Mel, changeling sorcerer foundling raised by Treska d'Jorasco, town healer. Known as Melina (human, Treska's apprentice); Malcolm (mine-worker, hangs out in the Feral Dog), and several others (including a trapper, a kid...). Party doesn't know about this, as I NPC Malcolm and the others. I'm really thinking that the Faceless One will be a changeling and will make some snarky comments before they wax him.
Fortunato, ex-mine-worked (fired by Smenk). He's always had this "trick" and found someone to give him some training. He's now a hexblade looking to make a new life for himself.

I've heavily used the Mentor/Apprentice rules from DMG 2 -- Mel's a healer apprentice (class skills C(Alchemy) and Heal, +2 to Alchemy, +2 on saves vs. poison and disease), and Fortunato's a soldier. That also explained why an ex-mine-worker knows how to use a sword :) Also, each PC gets 2 extra skill points to use on Craft or Profession skills... _very_ cool and highly recommended. The fighter carves (whittlin'), the cleric is learning from the town smith, the sorcerer's a healer/alchemist, and Fortunato's a stoneworker (from mining) heading into gambler.

For Kullen and co...

In the first session of the campaign they effectively ambushed and beat up one of the characters (a warforged new to town... basically alpha male behavior). I repeatedly noted that they were known for pulling the same tricks on other people as well, and used the line (to a character) "You'd love to get even, but you know you can't take them all on at once. Now, if it was you, one of them, and a dark alley...". So when they need to brace 'em I'm hoping they remember that.

Basically, beat 'em over the head with it. The other nice thing about bringing them in early is it makes the PCs _really_ hate them. I was hearing "OOC: Right, so we go, get some levels, and then...." :)

Oooo... I'd be very interested. Let me know if you can't post 'em and I'll put up my email addy.

I went looking for swarm images for the beetles... didn't find any good beetle pictures, but I did find stock photographs of bee swarms. Ugh, creepy. I'd post a link, but, yeah, stock photographs... Google Images for "bug swarm" should work.

Amusingly, one of the top hits for "Beetle swarm" was Reaper.

And I'm definitely going to use the Mummy for imagery of that swarm. It's just so perfect.

*bump*

I ran this set of encounters last night... wonderful! It really got the PCs to form together into a band rather than a bunch of people going in the same direction. So, both to gloat and for the inspiration of others...

The hook was Fortunato, ex-mine-worker who had been recently fired by Smenk. I decided he had seen a map on Smenk's desk and nabbed it. On the map were marked the Whispering Cairn and the mine office. So he decided that anythink Smenk is interested in he is... for revenge of course. He convinced the rest of the PCs to give the two a look. They went to the office, dealt with the stirges, and knocked on the door... only to hear "Go away!" in Goblin. Turns out the party fighter hates goblins...

Down goes the door! In starts the fighting! And now the PCs are talking about repairing the place, adding shelves for books (the fighter's a bibliophile, go figure) and a forge out back...

Sheer gold.

As a random note for the historically inclined... the map has the kitchen as attached. In my world it's going to be a separate building over by the well. Kitchens burn down, and you _don't_ want them attached to your house when they do. Instead the space'll be another office/storage room.

I've also got a Hexblade in the campaign. I worked him in as an otherwise ordinary person who came to the slow realization that karma was a little bit more proactive around him than around other people. He ended up getting fired (by Balabar Smenk, heh) as a scapegoat when a mineshaft collapse ended up crushing the legs of another worker... strange that that "other worker" had picked a fight with the character the week before.

That, a bit of a mentor/apprentice relationship (DMG2, very cool) with an ex-Cyran who also had "the Evil Eye", and we have an ex- and bitter miner who now knows how to use weapons and is looking to foment a bit of trouble for the mine bosses.

Hi everyboby!! Someone knows where I can find stats for the kenku? Dunno if it's in FF or MM2... Or more rapidly, if someone has it, I'd be very happy, since I decided to use them in an adventure tomorrow night! Yes, I badly need it!! Thanks!

I've got 'em in MM3. Mmmm 1-hit-die CR 1/2 birdies.